Elections office dealing with "problem" ballots

Medford, Ore. -- Jackson County voters may be done casting their ballots, but the work to certify them is far from over.

The clerk's office only has 14 days to help voters fix any problems.

Ballots have been dropped off, most of the votes have been counted, but the work isn't done yet.

"We just have a huge amount of work that has to go into this last little percentage of ballots," said Chris Walker, the Jackson County Clerk.

She said her office is dealing with anywhere between roughly 2000 to 3000 ballots with problems.

"We have probably 10-12 different categories of ballots that we have to hand-handle," said Walker.

A few of the many problems Walker is dealing with: things like ballots that are too thick to go through the sorter, or verifying signatures that look different from the signature on voters' registration cards, or spouses signing each other's ballots by mistake.

With the clock ticking, Walker is sending out a letter to make sure people can correct any signature issues.

"We're under the gun. By the end of this week, we want to get all those letters out to those voters so they have the opportunity to get their ballot counted," Walker said.

The signature on each ballot is checked, so it's a lot of tedious work to make sure each one is accurate.

If voters get a letters about signature verification in the mail, Walker said they shouldn't blow it off.

According to Walker, if a voter doesn't respond or doesn't get their most current signature on file, they won't be getting a ballot in November.

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